Editor’s Note: At least nine Iraqi protesters were reported killed on Friday as thousands of pro-democracy demonstrators challenged the corruption and brutality of the U.S.-supported government of Iraq, a country still occupied by American military forces.

The brutal crackdown on the Iraqi protests underscores a tricky reality facing Washington as it lectures authoritarian regimes in the Middle East to avoid bloodshed after having participated in the bloody conquest of Iraq, an operation that also undermined women's rights, William John Cox writes in this guest essay:

As the youth-led Freedom Movement of 2011 spreads rapidly across the Middle East, one can only wonder what would be happening in Iraq today if the U.S. had not invaded eight years ago.

Might Saddam Hussein have been driven from power by an internal popular uprising – as happened to Hosni Mubarak in Egypt and Zine El Abidine Ben Ali in Tunisia – without all the death and destruction wrought by George W. Bush’s invasion?

And, what does the overthrow of authoritarian governments – whether in Iraq from the U.S. invasion or in Tunisia from a popular uprising – portend for the rights of women? Will the changes unleash more Islamic fundamentalism and thus worsen the status of women in those countries?

Women’s rights continue to deteriorate in Iraq under the U.S.-installed Shiite government; their status is also threatened by Islamists in Tunisia, which – like Iraq – was long renowned as among the most secular of Arab nations.

It should be noted, too, that the personal liberties of women are under assault in the United States – by Christian fundamentalist politicians. The rise of fundamentalism, whether Islamic or Christian, almost always translates into fewer freedoms for women.

Iraq’s History

Under Iraq’s longtime Ba’athist government led by Saddam Hussein, Iraqi women enjoyed greater freedom than women in most other Arab nations and they played an active role in the political, economic and educational development of the nation.

However, at a cost of more than $1 trillion to the U.S. Treasury, President George W. Bush’s “Operation Iraqi Freedom” led to the slaughter of well over 100,000 Iraqis, including thousands of children, and the invasion resulted in women losing many of their previous rights.

Today, as the youth-driven Freedom Movement sweeps across the Middle East, it is touching Iraq, too, where freedom demonstrations have drawn thousands of protesters in the cities of Sulaimaniya, Falluja, Nassiriya Province, and Baghdad.

The U.S. mainstream media and the Obama Administration have been largely silent about the Iraqi demonstrations; however, fair-minded Americans should conclude that, absent the invasion, the young people of Iraq would have been in the forefront of the Freedom Movement of 2011.

If history had taken that course, untold lives would have been spared and vast sums of money could have been spent improving the quality of life rather than destroying Iraqi standards of living. Plus, the United States would today enjoy greater respect from the world for promoting freedom and the rule of law, rather than violating those principles.

The Tunisia Example

Tunisia, the site of ancient Carthage and the breadbasket of the Roman Empire, obtained its independence from the “protection” of France in 1957. Habib Bourguiba, the leader of the independence movement and the Destourian Socialist Party, was elected president, and for the next 30 years he presided over a largely secular government.

Originally founded upon socialist principles, modern Tunisia developed a large middle class and encouraged the liberation of women. One-third of its university professors are women, as are 58 percent of its university students, more than one-fourth of its judges, and 23 percent of its members of parliament.

Tunisia signed the U.N. Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women in 1980 and ratified it in 1985.

In 1987, President Bourguiba was succeeded by Ben Ali, the minister of national security, who had been trained as a military officer in France and the United States. Receiving financial support from the United States, President Ben Ali established a repressive police state and used police action again militant Islamic groups.

Relying upon a broad anti-terrorism law passed in 2003, President Ben Ali supported the U.S. war on terrorism by making hundreds of arbitrary arrests and engaging in official torture. He increasingly controlled news, information, and the Internet, and he targeted journalists with harassment, violence and constant surveillance.

However, they are also the ones with the most to lose, if religious fundamentalists come to power and erase women’s rights. During the uprising, concerned protesters carried signs that read, “Politics ruins religion and religion ruins politics.”

Since Ben Ali fled Tunisia in January, there have been indications that Islamic fundamentalists intend to crack down on Tunisia’s liberalism. A mob of religious zealots threatened legally-sanctioned brothels, which needed protection from security forces.

There also is concern about the rights of women wearing western dress, including bikinis on beaches. The unsettled conditions have caused many women to be afraid to walk outside alone at night.

The leadership of Ennahdha, a political movement allied with the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, has stated it is opposed to the imposition of Islamic law in Tunisia. But women have witnessed the loss of progressive women’s rights in three other Islamic nations, including Iran after the fall of the Shah, Afghanistan with the rise of the Taliban, and Iraq following the U.S. invasion.

To a certain extent, Tunisian women were protected from Islamic extremists by the repressive Ben Ali government; however, for now, they can only wait and see how the Jasmine Revolution evolves.

The Banner of Christianity

Muslim nations are not the only places where women have faced difficult battles to win and sustain their rights. Even today in the United States, Christian fundamentalists are threatening the rights of American women.

Instead of a beacon of liberty, the United States supports the suppression of freedom in other countries and has often denied constitutional rights to its own citizens, particularly women. The United States Constitution and the Bill of Rights established many rights for Americans, but excluded African slaves and women from many of those rights.

In the 1860s, the Civil War resulted in the 13th and 14th Amendments that abolished slavery and prohibited the states from abridging the rights of their “citizens.” The 15th Amendment guaranteed the right to vote to former slaves.

However, efforts to extend voting rights to women were blocked by Southern conservatives in the U.S. Senate, forcing women activists to battle for suffrage state by state. Women didn’t get the universal right to vote in the United States until 1920 with passage of the 19th Amendment.

Today, 90 years later, the U.S. Congress only seats 17 women out of 100 senators and 72 women representatives (16.6 percent). These percentages are less than the number of women legislators in either Iraq or Tunisia.

Indeed, the U.S. is one of only seven countries which has not ratified the treaty. (The other nations are Iran, Sudan, Somalia, Palau, Nauru and Tonga.) Although President Obama proclaimed the treaty to be a priority in May 2009, he has made no visible effort to secure its ratification by the Senate.

After gaining the right to vote in 1920, many women activists continued to believe the U.S. Constitution needed to be amended to ensure freedom from legal sex discrimination against women and to ensure the equal application of the Constitution to all citizens.

Commencing in the early 1940s, both Democrats and Republicans added support for an Equal Rights Amendment to their platforms; however, it was not until 1972 that pressure from organized labor and other mainstream groups caused Congress to pass ERA legislation.

As proposed to the states for ratification, the 27th Amendment simply said, “Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.”

The ERA continues to be reintroduced in each congressional session, and a coalition of women’s organizations are now working on a “three-state strategy,” in which, because of the ambiguity in the deadline language, ratification by only three of the remaining 15 states could add the amendment to the Constitution.

In recent years, many of the chief objections that the Right raised against the ERA have become largely moot as society’s attitudes have continued to change and women have pressed ahead into jobs traditionally held by men.

During the 1970s, one of the main objections to the ERA by conservative religious and political organizations was that women would no longer be exempt from compulsory military service and combat duty; however women are now fighting in almost every element of the “War on Terrorism,” except “close combat” troops including infantry, armor and Special Forces.

As U.S. Army Reserve Col. (Retired) Ann Wright has reported, “eight women soldiers from Fort Hood, Texas (six from the Fourth Infantry Division and two from the 1st Armored Cavalry Division) have died of ‘non-combat related injuries’ on the same base, Camp Taji, and three were raped before their deaths.

“Two were raped immediately before their deaths and another raped prior to arriving in Iraq. Two military women have died of suspicious ‘non-combat related injuries’ on Balad base, and one was raped before she died. Four deaths have been classified as ‘suicides.’”

The rate of sexual assault and rape in the military is double the civilian rate.

Rep. Jane Harman, D-California, testified that, “Women serving in the U.S. military are more likely to be raped by a fellow soldier than killed by enemy fire in Iraq.”

Half of all reported cases receive no official action, a third are dismissed, and only 8 percent are referred to Court Martial. Even then, the majority of those ultimately convicted receive only mild punishments.

In spite of these gruesome statistics, religious fundamentalism is driving legislative efforts that would further punish and humiliate women regarding their reproductive rights. Women are being denied basic contraception and are being punished for becoming pregnant. Some examples:

--Although Planned Parenthood does not currently spend any federal money on abortion services, House Republicans just voted to deny any funding to the organization, cutting money for contraceptives, HIV test, cancer screening and reproductive health services.

--A Republican-sponsored bill in the House of Representatives would deny any federal funding for abortions except in cases of “forcible rape or, if a minor, an act of incest.” Under the law, a 12-year-old girl coerced and impregnated by her step-father or a young woman subjected to date rape would be forced to bear the child.

Already, many American women must work outside the home to support an adequate standard of living for their families, even though the federal government does little to provide safe and nurturing daycare for their young children.

However, if these new legislative changes take effect, it would mean that – while 12-year-old boys can tell an adult woman what to do in Iraq – 12-year-old girls in the United States will be forced to suffer rape and sexual assault and to endure the pregnancies that result.

And, as sexual education for women regarding their bodies and reproductive health is eliminated, punishment for becoming pregnant is increased by making abortion illegal and shameful, and by eliminating funding for organizations that provide contraceptives and health care for pregnant women.

The U.S. has used images of the plight of women in the Middle East to justify illegal wars of aggression, while curtailing the rights of American women to determine the fate of their own bodies and by failing to protect them from sexual assaults.

The evils of alleged Iraqi “rape rooms,” which Bush cited during the pre-invasion propaganda campaign and which he claimed to have eliminated in Iraq, were merely transferred to the actions of warring soldiers, both U.S. and tribal, and by the rape and murder of innocent civilian women and fellow female soldiers.

Still, the banner of Christianity is now leading another crusade – this time against women in the United States who again face mounting discrimination and abuse.

Yet, as the tsunami of freedom spreads around the world and upon American shores, women and girls can only hope that it will deliver them from the repression and violence that victimizes women in this Citadel of Freedom.

William John Cox is a retired prosecutor and public interest lawyer, author and political activist. His efforts to promote a peaceful political evolution can be found at VotersEvolt.com, his writings are collected at WilliamJohnCox.com and he can be contacted at u2cox@msn.com.

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